Járnviðr
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In Norse mythology, Járnviðr (often anglicized as Járnvid), which means "Iron-wood", is a forest inhabited by troll women who bore giantesses and giant wolves.
Járnvid is mentioned in Völuspá (40):
- In the east sat an old woman in Iron-wood
- and nurtured there offspring of Fenrir
- a certain one of them in monstrous form
- will be the snatcher of the moon
-
- —Völuspá, Larrington's translation
The one that will be "the snatcher of the moon" is Mánagarmr (or Hati), and the "old woman" may refer to Fenrir's mother Angrboða[1].
Snorri Sturluson quotes this stanza and expands it in his Gylfaginning (12):
- A witch dwells to the east of Midgard, in the forest called Ironwood: in that wood dwell the troll-women, who are known as Ironwood-Women [járnviðjur]. The old witch bears many giants for sons, and all in the shape of wolves; and from this source are these wolves sprung. The saying runs thus: from this race shall come one that shall be mightiest of all, he that is named Moon-Hound [Mánagarmr]; he shall be filled with the flesh of all those men that die, and he shall swallow the moon
-
- —Gylfaginning, Brodeur's translation
The form "Járnviðjur" ("Iron-wood dwellers") is nowhere else to be found, but in singular, Járnviðja is listed in the þulur as a troll-wife, and in Eyvindr Skáldaspillir's Háleygjatal (2), this name refers to Skaði.
[edit] Note
- ^ Lindow 2002.
[edit] References
- The Poetic Edda. Trans. with an introd. and notes by Carolyne Larrington. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999. ISBN 0192839462.
- Snorri Sturluson. The Prose Edda. Trans. from the Icelandic with an introd. by Arthur Gilchrist Brodeur. New York: The American-Scandinavian Foundation, 1916.
- Lindow, John. Norse mythology : a guide to the gods, heroes, rituals, and beliefs. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002. ISBN 0195153820.
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